Estes Park Opinion

Community healing and a forward vision

Posted:
11/29/2013 09:57:50 AM MST

Each of us has had a different, equally challenging response to the flood, clean up and aftermath. All of us will be dealing with this experience far into the future. As we take on our day-to-day living, I ask that we, each in our own sphere, do the following

1. Release our anger, with ourselves, others around us, the situation, all of it,

2. Look for opportunities to heal the people and environment around us in any ways we feel called,

3. Release self-interest and put the interests of the community as a whole first and foremost,

4. Take time to reexamine past and future choices in light of positive change and positive use of power to empower the whole and not just a few, and

5. Be inclusive and representative in all projects, our best solutions may be sitting on the sidelines.

Our community has been swept clean. This is a gift for us to write a new history, a more collaborative history, for this unique time and place. Let us who may have sat on the sidelines seize opportunities to share our input and talents. Let us be wise stewards. Let us contribute in new and different ways. Let us be inclusive, giving each person an opportunity to use his/her gifts on behalf of us all. Let us generate a new spirit of communion that carries us into an new era of prosperity and love.

Sincerely,

Mary Ann Varanka Martin

Estes Park

Thanks for the service

Advertisement

We want to thank Todd Jirsa for his service to the people of Estes Park. In this era of elected officials who will do anything or say anything to get elected, Todd is a definite exception. We have watched Todd as he has served Estes Park and how he conducted himself.

Always prepared and always well informed. He had the most difficult balancing act of any of our elected officials. In his position, he tried to balance the needs of students, the parents, the teachers and the tax payers. He did it well. Thanks.

Mack and Audrey Hunt

Estes Park

Why?

The Heritage Foundation's most recent research and polling (along with many more of the most recent polls taken) reflect that Americans' opinions of Barack Obama as well as the so-called "Affordable" Care Act are at an all-time low. Why?

Shall we take a few wild guesses?

Could it be the $600,000,000, taxpayer-funded sham of a website that any moron in the world could have had built for $30,000?

Could it be the forced cancellation by the longer-than-the-Bible, 20,000-page "Unaffordable" Care Act legislation of a projected 80,000,000 health insurance policies that Obama and his administration "decided" they don't approve of?

Could it be the endless lies upon lies about the entire law that curiously began pre-2012 election and continue to this day ?

Could it be the doubling, tripling and quadrupling of working Americans' health insurance premiums?

Could it be the doubling, tripling and quadrupling of the projected cost of this unbelievably unaffordable, Affordable Care Act?

Could it be the fact that this monster will add tremendously to the already $17,000,000,000,000 national debt that must be paid for by the blood, sweat and tears of working Americans?

Could it be the millions of full-time jobs that have been knocked down to part-time jobs because of the laws' iron fist on the throats of businesses who are told they must pay...andpay...and pay for whomever they foolishly offer full-time, gainful employment to?

Gee, I just don't know what could possibly be causing Americans to finally realize who Barack Hussein Obama really is and what he is really doing to them and their country, do you?

I'm sure I've missed something.....

W. Craddock

Estes Park

Who were the Pilgrims?

This Thanksgiving we honor the Pilgrims who set our country on a new course that we should follow for as long as our country would survive. As the Mayflower left Plymouth, England her sails filled with a breeze, the breeze of freedom.

They left behind authoritarianism, restriction, government from the top down, bondage. They headed towards the New World. They had no idea if they'd ever get there, but as William Brewster said, "Yea, though we should lose our lives in this action ---- we know our endeavors would be honorable."

One hundred fifty years later, thirteen colonies severed their ties from the same country from which Pilgrims had come from for the same reason. Authoritarian, restrictive demands of the government. As George Washington watched the British armada of ships arriving and sail up the Hudson River he saw the massive power of King George. What could an army, a pittance in size do to overcome such power? In the same way that

the Pilgrims relied on the Lord of heaven and earth for help,so did

George Washington look to Him that gave to mankind the inalienable rights of Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness. A government that would be in the hands of the people, not in the hand of the few.

Then eleven years later representatives from thirteen united states met to set sail on an unknown course. Their destination was clear, but how to get there was an unknown. Never in the course of human history had it been possible for man to chart a way to freedom. Old Benjamin Franklin provided the tool that was needed. Pray. That was what they did then and for the next two and one half months. God heard and answered.

The pitfalls that America could fall into were well known. As these representatives knew history and had steered a course in partial self government for one-hundred fifty years. They had to find a way through the storms, the rocks, the shoals that the Mayflower had faced.

Many plans were suggested, debated and prayed about. The small ship the Mayflower fought against mountainous seas, conflicting winds and currents for sixty-six days, cooped up inside a leaky cabin, before they reached land. On the tip of a peninsula that they named Providence they wrote and signed a document that embraced the fundamentals of government that provided the course to follow for freedom.

This Thanksgiving let us thank God for the Pilgrims and for the course that they set. May we continue on that course.